Oscar-winning actress and Dior spokeswoman Charlize Theron rubs shoulders with long-dead movie stars Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly, and Marlene Dietrich in a new ad for the fashion brand promoting their J’Adore fragrance. The spot just premiered on the dior.com website.
Shot by Oscar-winning director Jean-Jacques Annaud (“In the Name of the Rose”, “Seven Years in Tibet”), the 90-second commercial features Theron – apparently late – rushing to a runway show she’s appearing in at Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors.
Set to the song “Heavy Cross” by dance-punk band The Gossip, we follow the actress as she encounters Kelly, Dietrich, and Monroe (in that order) before dressing up in a fabulous gold gown and strutting down a long hallway flanked by photographers:
CGI techniques were used to place the silver-screen legends in the ad, and it’s hard to deny the results are impressive – though I can’t help but wonder what the ladies would think of their images being used to promote a product post-obit. Monroe was also posthumously featured in a 1987 Chanel No. 5 commercial.
Theron’s next film is the Diablo Cody-penned/Jason Reitman-directed “Young Adult”, which is set to premiere on December 16th.
For the record, Monroe died in 1962 (age 36), Kelly in 1982 (age 52), and Dietrich in 1992 (age 90). I’m still working on a half-baked conspiracy theory to account for those “convenient” ten-and-twenty-year spans…